“Haydn-Mozart plus” series with Gábor Takács-Nagy

The first concerts of the popular "Haydn-Mozart Plus" series will be held on November 25th, 26th and 27th in the Italian Cultural Institute of Budapest. The concerts will be conducted by Gábor Takács-Nagy, whose earlier, highly successful appearances with the BFO have proven that he is one of the finest specialists of the Viennese classical repertoire.

The first half of the concerts will feature works by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, his rarely performed overture to Lucia Silla and his Sinfonia Conertante in E Flat Major for oboe, horn, clarinet, bassoon and orchestra, with Emmanuel Lavine (oboe), Zoltán Szőke (horn), Ákos Ács (clarinet) and Mihály Duffek (bassoon) as soloists. After the intermission audiences will hear Mozart’s Divertimento in B Major K.137 and Joseph Haydn’s Symphony No.101 (“The clock”).

All three concerts will take place in the Italian Cultural Institute, built originally as home of the Hungarian Parliament and will start at 7.45 p.m.

The conductor of the concerts, Gábor Takács-Nagy was born in Budapest and started playing the violin at the age of eight. As a student of the Liszt Academy of Music he won first prize at the Jenő Hubay Violin Competition in 1979, then studied with Nathan Milstein. Between 1975 and 1992 he was first violin of the world famous Takács Quartet and performed with legendary musicians like Yehudi Menuhin, Georg Solti, Gidon Kremer, Jean-Pierre Rampal, Isaac Stern, and Mstislav Rostropovich. From 1993 – during ten years – he was concert master of the Budapest Festival Orchestra. In 1996 he joined the faculty of the Conservatoire de Musique de Genève as Professor of String Quartet. He has conducted since 2001, and this became his main activity today. Since 2007 he has been music director of the Chamber Orchestra of Verbier Festival and since 2011 music director of Manchester Camerata. Mr. Takács-Nagy will be from the 2012/2013 season first guest conductor of the Budapest Festival Orchestra.